Israeli
tractors tore down a section of the barrier, a metal fence. A new concrete
barrier has been erected some 1,970ft from the old route near the Jewish
settlement of Modiin Illit.
The Israeli military tore down a watchtower overlooking Bilin on Wednesday and
protesters rammed a bulldozer into the fence on Friday.
The section covered by the ruling is in Bilin, a Palestinian village about 15
miles east of Tel Aviv, and the scene of often violent weekly protests
against a barrier Israel calls a security necessity and Palestinians condemn
as a land grab.
The Israeli courts ruled in 2007 that the fence had to be moved after a
petition from Bilin landowners two years previously. This prompted a
to-and-fro with Israel's Defence Ministry until a final re-routing plan was
accepted.
Colonel Saar Tzur, commander of an Israeli military brigade in the region,
said moving the barrier would give Palestinians access to about 140 acres of
farmland, though they still remain cut off from a further 50 of land.
Mohammed al-Khteeb, coordinator for Bilin's Popular Resistance movement, said
the move was good, but not enough.
"It makes me happy but still we are far away from what we are looking for
and what we want to achieve, because the largest part of the village lands
are still confiscated by the new route," Khteeb said.
Israel started building the network of metal fencing, barbed wire and concrete
walls in 2002 following a wave of Palestinian suicide bombings.
The World Court in The Hague said in 2004 that the proposed 720-km (430-mile)
barrier cutting through the West Bank was illegal, citing its route inside
territory that Israeli forces occupied in a 1967 war.
Tzur said the total cost of the re-routing came to 31 million NIS (about $9
million), including Israel's replanting of Palestinian-owned olive trees to
prevent them from being damaged by the work.
